Climb Iowa

This year for Christmas we gave the kids a one-month membership to Climb Iowa, an indoor rock-climbing gym about 10 minutes from our house. Yesterday we made our first trip. The kids had a great time. We hope to go about twice a week for the month of January.

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2016-2017 New Year’s

As usual, we went to the Reagens’ for New Year’s Eve. We had a lot of food, fun, and spent the night. 

Cousins. The littlest girls had gone to sleep already.

This year also introduced a potential new tradition – Cupcake Wars. On New Year’s Eve we were checking out the Reagens’ new TV, watching some HD desert videos. Someone said it would be better if they were dessert videos, and next thing you know we were watching cupcake wars. We watched the first half of an episode, watched the ball drop in New Orleans, and then watched the second half. Everyone enjoyed it, except Nate who could not have cared less. 

Then, on New Year’s Day we were going to watch another episode, but it was removed from Netflix. . . . so we decided to have our own real-life episode. The teams were Erin and Ian against Susan, Hope, and Mari. They had 45 minutes to make gourmet cupcakes using some of the ingredients that we had laid out: limes, sparkling raspberry spritzer, and peanut butter. They were not allowed to follow any recipes!

Getting Started

 

Accusations

In the end, both teams produced some rockin’ cupcakes, and the judges deferred judgement until next year. 

The Final Products

Christmas 2016

This year for Christmas it was the usual suspects, in an unusual order. On Christmas Eve we went to Mimi & Papa’s in the afternoon. The Connors were in town for the couple of days before Christmas, so we had our Liess Christmas gathering at this time. After lunch, presents, and a show from the kids, we headed to Mass at Holy Trinity, took our usual loop through some streets decked out Christmas lights, then picked up some pizza on the way home.

We spent Christmas morning opening presents and enjoying our chocolate chip pancakes. In the afternoon we had some time to play with our new toys before heading to the Reagens’ for Nate’s birthday. 

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Christmas Cookies

Yesterday Susan and the kids made some Christmas cookies to share with the neighbors and for general consumption. It was quite a mess, but I believe a good time was had by all.

Santa Visit

To this day, Lucia thinks that Santa travels in a fire truck and when we see a fire truck she says, “There’s Santa!”

The Clive Fire Department escorts Santa around town to visit the kids in the neighborhood. The kids all love it. 

Christmas Cookies

Last night we went to the Gustafsons’ for dinner and Christmas sweater decorating. Dinner was great, cookies were decorated, and everyone enjoyed the Wii dancing game.

Cookie Production
Andrew’s Sweater
Rose loved the icing!

Oh Christmas Tree!

Hard Workers
Hard Workers

Last night we put up our real Christmas tree. We also have an artificial tree that we put in the front room. The kids love finding and hanging their ornaments from years past. 

Rose even got into the action this year. It seems like she will like the Christmas tree, so by Christmas I fully expect most of the ornaments to be out of her reach. 

This calls for a celebration!

Rose’s Halloween Costume

Our Little Pumpkin
Our Little Pumpkin

Rose was not too keen on her costume on Beggars Night, but today she wanted to put it on. She kept it on for about 5 minutes. Maybe she figured out people weren’t handing out candy anymore?

Halloween 2016

Lucia
Lucia
We had dinner at the Thompsons' before heading out with this crew.
We had dinner at the Thompsons’ before heading out with this crew.
Liesland Crew
Liesland Crew
Raggedy Anns
Raggedy Anns
Rose getting in on the action. She tried to go in people's houses and once she found out there was candy she wanted to go to every house.
Rose getting in on the action. She tried to go in people’s houses and once she found out there was candy she wanted to go to every house.

Our Pumpkin Paradise

This afternoon, with Mar-Mar & Be-Bob in town, we visited Our Pumpkin Paradise. It is the kids’ favorite pumpkin patch in town, with many activities including ‘The Box’. The kids always have fun picking out their pumpkins and playing in the corn.

Happy New Year!

This year we spent our New Year’s Eve at the Reagens’, where we are nearly every year! It is always a blast and the kids love to party.